To surmount these challenges, MacArthur relied on all three components of his Allied forces. Unfortunately, his air, land, and sea elements were all inadequate. Fortunately, MacArthur had capable component commanders. MacArthur became supreme commander of Allied Forces in the Southwest Pacific Area (SWPA) on April 18, 1942. His land component commander was an Australian, General Sir Thomas Blamey. His initial naval component commander was Vice Admiral Herbert F. Leary. Vice Admiral Arthur S. Carpender took control of the Allied Naval Forces SWPA in September 1942. Carpender’s command became the vaunted Seventh Fleet in March 1943 and functioned as MacArthur’s navy.63
His original air commander was Lieutenant General George H. Brett. A capable airman, Brett had arrived in Australia before MacArthur. Because of Brett’s rank, his recommendations to cut off reinforcements to the Philippines, and his close working relationship with the Australian leadership, MacArthur probably saw Brett as a potential rival to his command. “Brett’s relief,” moreover, “was also the result of his ‘complete failure to accommodate’ MacArthur’s wishes.”64 Brett had to go. Brett’s replacement, Major General George C. Kenney, was an exceptional choice. From MacArthur’s perspective, none surpassed Kenney in “those three great essentials of combat leadership: aggressive vision, mastery of air tactics and strategy, and the ability to exact the maximum in fighting qualities from both men and equipment.”65 Kenney did not disappoint.
Though Kenney was the consummate air commander, MacArthur did not always act as the ideal joint force commander. He was successful, but he often had to be reminded that military operations in his area of responsibility were multinational. Marshall chided MacArthur for the apparent lack of Allied officers on his staff. The Allies contributed, especially General Blamey and his Australians, but MacArthur limited Allied participation in key positions and he favored the use of American troops over Allied forces. MacArthur’s Sixth Army commander, Lieutenant General Walter Krueger, “suspected that MacArthur and his staff designed it [Sixth Army] to prevent General Blamey, the Australian in charge of the Allied Forces, from controlling American combat forces.”66
The greater concern for MacArthur and Admiral Chester Nimitz, the Pacific Ocean Areas commander, was how much manpower and matériel they would have to prosecute the war. The Europe-first strategy initially limited what Pacific commanders would receive and when they would get it. Moreover, there was no overall commander identified for the Pacific effort. MacArthur understood the importance of unity of command, and he recommended the selection of an overall commander. Although MacArthur was the senior ranking officer, he was “willing to accept a subordinate position to accomplish the general good.” The role of overall commander in the Pacific, such as that Eisenhower was to play in Europe, was never filled. “The failure to do so,” MacArthur determined, “cannot be defended in logic, in theory, or in common sense.”67 The decentralized command structure had its drawbacks, but it would have been extremely difficult to have a single Pacific commander, given the personalities involved and the theater’s geography.
The first changes in the strategic situation occurred in the Coral Sea in May 1942 and then most decisively at Midway in June. Those American victories altered the strategic balance. They halted the Japanese advance and forced the Japanese to reestablish a smaller defensive perimeter. Australian defensive operations in Papua and New Guinea in July, coupled with the Guadalcanal effort in August 1942, marked the beginning of a coordinated campaign to isolate or destroy the Japanese stronghold of Rabaul, on New Britain island. After Midway, the Japanese turned their attention toward Milne Bay off the far southeastern corner of New Guinea. The Japanese needed to control this strategic location to protect their advance on the Australian-controlled city of Port Moresby. In anticipation of the Japanese action, MacArthur built air, land, and sea bases at the head of Milne Bay. Besides the sea approach, the Japanese could also use the Kokoda Trail to launch an overland assault against Moresby from their stronghold at Buna. As the Japanese advanced over the Owen Stanley Mountains toward Moresby, a contingent of Australians stopped them at Imita. The Japanese advance having been halted, the Allied strategic plan took shape. MacArthur saw an opportunity to attack the enemy, and he rushed as many forces as he could to the area. General Blamey served as the commander, and Lieutenant General Robert L. Eichelberger led the U.S. I Corps. To reinforce the effort, MacArthur had two regiments from the 32nd Division transported by air. “This was the first large scale airborne troop movement by the United States forces in any theater of operations,” he observed.68 By the end of October 1942, close to five divisions were available to press the initiative.
While conducting these operations in New Guinea, MacArthur supported the South Pacific Command’s efforts at Guadalcanal. He supported Guadalcanal with bombers while using short-range aircraft to promote operations in New Guinea. Japanese resistance and Allied logistical challenges limited the offensive’s speed and effectiveness. MacArthur’s ground force lacked covering artillery and possessed insufficient small landing craft for an amphibious assault at Buna. The Navy was unwilling to risk its destroyers and smaller craft in uncharted and dangerous waters. MacArthur reverted to infiltration tactics he had experienced in World War I. Without additional forces, the situation stalemated. MacArthur finally sent Eichelberger in with the last reserves and the Allied forces took Buna on December 14, 1942.69 By late January 1943 this phase of the New Guinea campaign had ended.
This campaign provided MacArthur with valuable insights on modern war. The use of integrated and coordinated air, land, and sea capabilities had created a new type of warfare. MacArthur referred to this as “triphibious warfare.” It also guided his strategic thought. MacArthur determined that he had to avoid frontal attacks, bypass Japanese strong points, and neutralize them by cutting their supply lines to isolate and starve them on the battlefield. He referred to this strategic approach as “leapfrogging,” as opposed to the “island hopping” associated with the central Pacific campaigns. This was not an original concept. He simply adapted the classic strategy of envelopment to modern conditions. MacArthur clearly understood the need for joint operations even though his staff lacked a joint presence. He understood that one service or branch was not going to defeat the Japanese without the support of the other. His approach was also the “ideal method for success by inferior but faster-moving forces. The paucity of the resources at my command,” MacArthur concluded, “made me adopt this method of campaign as the only hope of accomplishing my task.”70 The lack of aircraft carriers was the most critical shortfall. Without land-based airpower, carriers were critical. Unfortunately, he rarely had command of the carrier forces he required.
The New Guinea campaign opened the way for the drive up the northern coast. The primary goal of 1943 was to cut off Japanese means to sustain the war. MacArthur knew direct pressure would take time, but his isolation strategy offered a viable solution. MacArthur planned to apply his envelop, incapacitate, and “‘hit ‘em where they ain’t—let them die on the vine’ philosophy.”71
The U.S. Sixth Army headquarters arrived in early 1943. MacArthur wanted Walter Krueger as the commanding general “because of [his] long and intimate association with him.” By mid-February 1943 all American combat troops serving under MacArthur were assigned to the Sixth Army. This allowed MacArthur to keep American forces away from General Blamey. MacArthur chose wisely. Krueger “became to the Sixth Army what George Kenney was to the Fifth Air Force.”72 The relationship between the two would not always be cordial, but each general respected the other.
General Douglas MacArthur (right) with Major General Jonathan Wainwright, 1943. (Library of Congress)
The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) approved the plan (Operation Cartwheel) to secure the remainder of New Guinea in March 1943. Krueger’s Alamo Force initiated the offensive. The Third Fleet attacked New Georgia, in the Solomon Islands, and controlled it by October 7. MacArthur’s primary target was Lae, located on the northern New Guinea
coast. To distract the Japanese from Lae, MacArthur used deception effectively. When the Japanese reinforced Wewak, northwest of Lae, Kenney’s air force eliminated the air threat. The seizure of Lae began in September with an airborne assault at Nadzab. Lae fell on September 16.73
Meanwhile, MacArthur also used the Fifth Air Force to wreak havoc on Rabaul. MacArthur did not want a direct assault on the Japanese stronghold, but he did want to inflict as much damage as possible to limit Japanese operations. Kenney launched a massive raid on October 12, 1943. MacArthur was elated. “George, you broke Rabaul’s back yesterday,” he told Kenney, who replied, “The attack marks the turning point in the war in the Southwest Pacific.”74
Japanese resistance on New Guinea continued after Lae fell. MacArthur’s forces next secured the Admiralty Islands in February 1944. MacArthur once again decided to bypass the remaining Japanese strongpoints; he secured the weaker locations at Aitape and Hollandia. The plan was risky, but MacArthur was a risk taker. The opportunity to advance almost five hundred miles up the New Guinea coastline appealed to MacArthur’s need for speed in his quest to return to the Philippines. MacArthur’s push for Hollandia was indicative of his infamous impatience. He always pushed his subordinate commanders “to meet continually revised deadlines.” His use of deception in conjunction with coordinated naval and air support secured the objective. Nimitz supported the operation because the timing did not interfere with his own campaign.75 Once again, MacArthur’s strategic concept and operational approach proved wildly successful.
With Hollandia and Aitape secure, MacArthur looked to the Vogelkop Peninsula. It was the last Japanese stronghold on the island. The Allied capture of Sansapor in late July ended the long and hard-fought New Guinea campaign. By August 10, 1944, all effective Japanese resistance had ceased. MacArthur’s offensive had advanced 1,800 miles west and 700 miles north since 1942.76 He had employed operational maneuver and used deception as well as any great captain in military history. He was now poised to fulfill his promise to liberate the Filipino people.
Before he could return to the Philippines, he had to confer with President Roosevelt on grand strategy. In July 1944 Roosevelt and Admiral William D. Leahy held a conference in Hawaii. Both MacArthur and Nimitz attempted to convince the president to approve their strategies to defeat Japan. This was MacArthur’s first opportunity to provide direct input into American and Allied grand strategy. The key issue centered on whether to secure the Philippines or Formosa. The Navy wanted Formosa; MacArthur argued for the Philippines. MacArthur opposed the Navy’s approach on strategic and psychological grounds. From his perspective, Formosa, with a hostile population, might prove useless as a base of attack against Japan. His most convincing argument, however, was moral. He stressed that the United States could not sacrifice the Philippines a second time. Roosevelt approved MacArthur’s plan.77
The liberation of the Philippines was “the most important strategic objective in the Southwest Pacific Area,” according to MacArthur. He selected Mindanao as the initial objective. MacArthur hoped to establish a foothold by November 15 and then turn toward the Leyte Gulf region by December 20, 1944. After the Third Fleet struck Mindanao in September, Admiral William F. Halsey reported weak resistance, which suggested that the path to Leyte was “wide open.” If that was true, MacArthur could shift his timetable by two months and expedite the liberation.78
MacArthur knew the Leyte assault would be a difficult undertaking. The major risk was the lack of ground-based air support. In its absence, MacArthur had to rely on naval airpower. Leyte was the springboard from which MacArthur would seize Luzon, Manila, and then Japan. The SWPA commander departed Hollandia on October 16, 1944, aboard his flagship, the USS Nashville. After the first two assault waves stormed Leyte’s beaches, MacArthur landed with the third. In one of the most famous moments of the Pacific war, MacArthur waded ashore with Filipino President-in-Exile Sergio Osmena. Once he completed his dramatic entrance, he broadcast the following: “People of the Philippines: I have returned. By the grace of Almighty God, our forces stand again on Philippine soil—soil consecrated in the blood of our two peoples.”79
MacArthur had returned, but the Leyte beachhead was not firmly secured when the entire operation was almost undermined. Halsey’s fleet was supposed to protect the northern approaches to Leyte Gulf. Unfortunately, he bit on a Japanese deception operation. He raced northward after Admiral Jisaburo Ozawa’s fleet, while the remaining Japanese naval forces sought to isolate and annihilate the invasion force. In what became the greatest naval battle in history, the Japanese had constructed a daring but potentially highly rewarding operation to thwart Allied efforts to seize Leyte. The enemy commander, Admiral Soemu Toyoda, had divided his fleet into three distinct groups. The central force was to transit through the critical San Bernardino Straits while the southern force sailed through Mindanao Sea and Surigao Straits. The two naval elements would execute a pincer movement around Leyte and destroy the Allied invasion force. Admiral Ozawa’s northern force was a decoy. The ruse worked; Halsey chased Ozawa’s force far to the north and away from Leyte.80 Without Halsey’s air support, MacArthur’s return would be a short one if the Japanese battleships joined forces in Leyte Gulf.
Luck, and the tenacity of Vice Admiral Thomas Kincaid’s remaining Seventh Fleet elements, ultimately saved the amphibious force from disaster. The damage inflicted on the Japanese central force caused them to retreat. Halsey could not send his battleships to Leyte quickly enough to sink the retreating force. His risky chase of Ozawa had sunk four Japanese carriers, but those vessels were empty of the aircraft that had made them a real threat. Halsey’s action did not endear the Navy or its promises of air support to MacArthur. Ultimately, the Japanese defeat at Leyte Gulf ensured Allied control of Leyte. It also set the stage for MacArthur’s next and most important objective—the liberation of Luzon.
On December 18, 1944, MacArthur received his fifth star and assumed the newly created rank of General of the Army. His promotion occurred one day before Nimitz became a fleet admiral and two days after Marshall became a five-star general. MacArthur selected Mindoro, off the coast of Luzon, as a preliminary objective before invading Luzon, to ensure he had ground-based airpower to support his forces. There would be no need to rely on the Navy. The Japanese on Luzon, unlike those on Mindoro, offered stiff opposition to the Allied advance. MacArthur’s intelligence section estimated 137,000 Japanese on the island. The Sixth Army estimated 234,000. In reality, the Japanese had more than 287,000 troops determined to defend Luzon to the last soldier.81
After Mindoro fell, the Japanese did not reinforce Luzon; but despite their isolation and the futility of resistance, the Japanese troops there did not surrender. They literally fought to the death to hold the island. MacArthur’s plan to defeat the remaining Japanese was as risky as his earlier ones had been. Krueger’s Sixth Army landed an amphibious force on northern Luzon to divert Japanese forces from the south. Eichelberger’s Eighth Army conducted an amphibious landing in the south, where it met weak Japanese resistance. MacArthur boarded his new flagship, the USS Boise, on January 4, 1945. The Boise anchored near Lingayen on January 9. The amphibious operation secured a twelve-mile-wide beachhead, and MacArthur waded ashore from his I Corps landing craft onto the soil of Luzon for the first time since his departure in 1941.82
General Douglas MacArthur, 1945. (Library of Congress)
As American forces advanced southward, Japanese resistance stiffened. The difficult Filipino terrain favored defensive positions. As they had done on Leyte, “every Japanese soldier fought to the death.” It took twelve days to get to Tarlac, the halfway point to Manila. “The speed of our advance,” MacArthur concluded, “gave the enemy little, and in some cases, no time to utilize their well-prepared defense positions.” Speed and audacity overcame Japanese defensive advantages. MacArthur also had the advantage of time. Since the Japanese forces were not being reinforced, he could have waited for the Japanese to starve, but siege
warfare was too slow. MacArthur moved as quickly as possible to free imprisoned Allied soldiers and to rescue imperiled Filipino civilians. As the Sixth Army pressed toward Manila from the north and the Eighth Army moved toward the capital from the south, MacArthur decided to expedite the city’s liberation. In late January he ordered the 1st Cavalry Division to conduct a rapid assault. By February 3 the unit was on Manila’s northern edges, but the Japanese fought fanatically over the next two weeks. MacArthur ruefully concluded that the Japanese resistance had “caused numerous unnecessary casualties and much destruction of property.”83
With Luzon relatively secure, MacArthur focused on the occupied southern islands. He used the coordinated efforts of the Eighth Army, Seventh Fleet, and Thirteenth Air Force to free them. On June 28, 1945, MacArthur proclaimed that the “entire island of Luzon, embracing 40,420 square miles and a population of 8,000,000, is now liberated.”84 By July 4 the entire nation was free. It had not been as quick or as bloodless as MacArthur had wanted, but it served as a testament to MacArthur’s leadership and strategic wisdom. Moreover, the initial success of MacArthur’s operations in Luzon, combined with the capture of Iwo Jima in February, set the stage for the Ryukyus campaign in April 1945. Although the bloody fight for the Ryukyus Islands did not end until June, Okinawa, the largest of the Ryukyus, was critical to Allied invasion plans to secure air bases proximate to mainland Japan.
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